482 KILLIGREW— KING-BIRD 



This may be the most convenient phice to speak of the con- 

 geners of the Killdeer, of which there are several in America, and 

 y among them may be noticed jE. semipalmata, curiously resembling 

 "^/^ ^ the ordinary Ringed Plover of the Old World, ^. hiaticula, except 

 that it has its toes connected by a web at the base ; and yE. nivosa, 

 a bird inhabiting the western parts of both the American con- 

 tinents, which in the opinion of some authors is only a local form 

 of the widely-spread jE. aiexandrina or cantiana, best known as the 

 Kentish Plover, from its discovery near Sandwich, though it is 

 far more abundant in many other parts of the Old World (Geo- 

 graphical Distribution, p. 341). The common Einged Plover, 

 jE. hiaticola, has many of the habits of the Killdeer, but is much 

 less often found away from the sea-shore, though it has stations 

 on dry Avarrens in certain parts of England many miles from the 

 coast, and in Lapland at a still greater distance. In such localities 

 it has the habit of paving its nest with small stones, whence it is 

 locally known as the " Stone-hatch," a habit almost unaccount- 

 able unless regarded as an inherited instinct from shingle-haunting 

 ancestors. 



About thirty species all apparently referable with 2:»ropriety to 

 the genus jEgialitis have been described, but probably so many do 

 not exist. Some, as the Kentish Plover above named, have a very 

 extended distribution, for that, letting alone its supposed Ameri- 

 can habitat, certainly occurs in greater or less numbers on the 



coasts of China, India and Africa 

 generally. On the other hand 

 there is one, the ^E. sandx-hehnx, 

 which seems to be restricted to 

 the island whence it takes its 

 scientific name, and is there called 

 the "Wire-bird" {This, 1873, p. 

 Thinornis. (From Buiier.) ' 260). Nearly allied to .:£'f7^a^^^/s 



are two genera peculiar to the 

 New-Zealand Region — Thinornis, which, having been separated on 

 the slightest grounds, does not call for any particular remark, and 

 the extraordinary Anarhynclms (Wrybill). 



KILLIGREW, an old name for the CHOUGH. 



KING-BIRD ^ is the epithet almost universally applied in the 

 United States to the best-knoAni representative of the Ti/rannidx, 

 or the " Tyrant Flycatchers." In some of the rural districts, 



^ For this article I have to thank tlie well-known American ornithologist, Dr. 

 Shufeldt ; but I have to add that more than one species of Teen is called 

 " King-bird" by sailors, and the name may be often met with in the narratives 

 of whaling or sealing voyages to the Southern Ocean. — A. N. 



